Gundam Seed AU: Divergent Path
by Vampwriter
Summary: The Gundam Seed universe has been turned upside down. The characters you thought you knew have changed due to lifealtering experiences. What will happen is anyone's guess.
1. End to Peace

Gundam Seed AU

Divergent Path

Disclaimer: Sorry, Buster blew it up. I will say this, though: The characters are Out Of Character!

Chapter One

A young, brown haired girl of about fourteen sits at a computer at her university campus doing work for the professor she works for. The news is on in the background for noise.

(The refugee camp in South Africa has been suffering from chronic lack of food and relief supplies putting the lives of 2.1 million people at risk. We'll now bring you images from the Kaohsiung front…)

With computer on lap and notes in hand Kira Yamato taps away at her laptop.

(…the ZAFT forces have approached to within six kilometers of Kaohsiung…)

As she works her mechanical pet bird, Torii lands on the top of her computer. "Torii?" the bird asks. At the same time a call is heard at the edge of her hearing.

"Kira!"

She looks up from her work and sees two of her friends coming up the path toward her.

"So this is where you're hangin' out," said her friend Tolle Koenig. "Professor Kato was looking for you."

"What, again?" Kira asks.

Miriallia Haw nods. "He's asked us to bring you to him right away. What is it about? Are you assisting him with something else?"

The brown haired Coordinator sighs and turns, placing the laptop on the table. "Too much. I'm still not finished with the stuff he dumped on me yesterday." Her face has a tired set to it speaking of how many hours she's been putting into her work.

(It's begun! Hurry! Hurry! Run away! That way's just as dangerous!)

Tolle comes over and looks at the news window on the computer. "Huh, some development in the news, boss?" he asks quietly.

Kira nods, "Yeah, in Taiwan, apparently. The Kaohsiung area."

(I am within seven kilometers of Kaohsiung where the sounds of fierce combat continue to echo.)

Tolle gasps, "If this is footage from last week they may have already taken over Kaohsiung."

"That's what it looks like," Kira said quietly as she taps the top of her computer to close the holo screen.

"Kaohsiung isn't that far away from Orb, is it?" Mir asks. "Will the homeland be all right?"

"Torii!" Torii said, and flies off again.

"I wouldn't worry too much about it," Tolle responds. "Oh they're close by, but our nation's neutral. I can't see Orb turning into a battlefield."

"Well enough of this!" Kira said, suddenly all business. She looked at Tolle, "How's the schedule proceeding, Chief Koenig? Are we on time?"

His face sets and he nods. "Equipment stores are fully stocked. We're ready for just about anything that can be thrown at us. Equipment for the G.U.N.D.A.M.s is loaded and the catapults are ready. The only down side is the G.U.N.D.A.M.s themselves. Sad to say, ma'am, the only two functional are your Wing and the Heavyarms."

Kira sighs, "Do you have a time-table on how long it will be before the other three are ready for service?"

"The best estimate we can come up with is Altron can be ready in two days if we focus on it. Sandrock and Deathsythe in about a week after."

The brunet Coordinator nods, "Good, get Altron ready for combat ASAP." She turns to Miriallia, "How's the status of the CIC?" Kira gathers up her computer and places it in her bag before getting up and starts toward picking up their ride to work.

Mir and Tolle fall into step with their 'leader' as the other brunet Coordinator responds, "CIC is fully functional, captain. Gatherers inform me that our presence hasn't been noticed. I, too, have my own share of bad news. On our defenses we're not up to full yet. Only one Gottfried is operable. We lost the other when a power coupling blew. Best estimates we can figure it'll be another five hours before it'll be back online. We also have both Parsifal cannons and will soon have all of our PDLs; two or three are still non-functional."

"What about the Long-nines?" Kira asks.

"Both are online, ma'am. And while the missiles are all loaded we only have half our launchers for the Hammerheads and Sledgehammers and the Helldart launchers have yet to be activated. They'll be ready in an hour I'm told."

Torii lands on Kira's shoulder as they walk and she reaches up to pet the metal bird and remembers the friend who gave it to her not long ago…

(flashback)

They stood together on the lunar school campus, sakura blossoms falling all around them. Her friend, Athrun Zala stood before her a sad look on his face mirroring her own as they prepared to say goodbye.

"The PLANTs and Earth will see eye-to-eye," her assured her, "There will be no war." Athrun handed Kira Torii, the little green mecha hopping into her hands and Kira held it close. "The evacuation doesn't mean a thing. You'll join me at the PLANTs, right Kira?"

Kira nodded, "I'll try to talk my parents into letting me go. They've been talking about moving to an Orb controlled territory to get away from the war, so chances are that we won't be seeing each other for a while."

Athrun nodded in resignation and moved to hug Kira, which she gladly returned, Torii hopped to her shoulder to avoid being crushed. "Take care of yourself, Kira. Keep safe if I don't see you."

Kira nodded into violet-haired boy's shoulder. "You too. You've been like the brother I've never had all these years. I'd hate to see something happen to you."

The two childhood friends separated and Kira watched as Athrun walked away to catch his transport home.

(end flashback)

It's been two years since she's seen Athrun and Kira often finds herself wondering how her old friend is doing. Kira stairs into the distance as her memories pass until one of her friends passes into her vision.

"Hey, Kira!" Tolle calls.

Kira stumbles back and almost falls if not for Miriallia's quick reflexes. She looks back at her friend and smiles thankfully.

"Where were you?" Tolle asks.

Kira simply walks on, a small smile on her face. After a moment she answers, "Thinking about an old friend."

The group walks down the road toward the auto-taxis zone that would take them into Morgenroete. A few minutes later they arrive and see three people standing at the stop waiting for a ride as well: Flay Allster, Misha Yamano and Jessica Simmons, all members of Kira's group here on Heliopolis. Also, there was a special relationship between Kira and Flay, who currently is being interrogated by her two friends.

"I'm telling you nothing happened!" Flay denies.

"Oh come on!" Jessica presses.

"Yeah everyone already knows about your relationship," Misha says, "And you were invited to her quarters last night."

The look on her face tells Kira that her girlfriend would rather not be having that conversation.

"All we did was have dinner last night," Flay responds, "Absolutely nothing happened!" she looks up and sees the other three coming. She almost performs the salute that the rest of them had come up with but stops when she sees the gentle smile on Kira's face. Flay stills and her smile matches Kira's own. Flay has known for over ten months that Kira was a Coordinator, bit since she'd gotten to know Kira and several other Coordinators at the colony her opinions of them as a whole changed a bit. She was introduced to Kira through her mutual friendship with Mir, who she learned was a Coordinator herself. The two quickly grew to be friends. As they worked together in the Morgenroete facility under Doctor Kato Flay found herself falling in love with the brainy, yet quiet Coordinator. Five months ago she confessed her feelings for Kira. Feelings Kira returned in full. They managed to keep their relationship quiet, the only two who knew were Mir and Sai Argyle, once Flay's Fiancee he let her go when he saw how much they were in love. Now Flay and Kira come together and greet each other with gentle kisses.

Flay remembers how she had come to be part of Kira's organization to oppose the war. In response they hacked the Earth Alliance and ZAFT databases and discovered the EAF was using their colony to develop the _Archangel_ and its accompanying mobile suits. So they took those plans and began modifying them for their own uses. In the process of finding information one of their "Gatherers" discovered something about Patrick Zala. That he was completely insane! When Kira told her that Zala's plan was to wipe out all Naturals she joined the growing resistance to the war effort and secretly recruited people to assist. Construction of their new ship began as they diverted supplies to the hanger they sealed off. Now the ship, their _Defender_, is almost ready for service.

They separate and Kira asks, "So where are you guys going?"

"Oh nowhere really," Flay responds, "We're just going out to have some fun today."

Kira nods. Flay and the others had all been working hard these last few months and deserved some time off. "Well you three just be careful, okay? Something's nagging at the edge of my senses, and it's making me uncomfortable. If anything happens I want you to stick together and get back to Morgenroete. If not find a shelter to hunker down in until you can be retrieved."

Jess nods in response, "Don't worry, we'll take good care of Flay for you."

A quiet voice behind them clears it's throat. The turn and see three older individuals behind them, a woman and two men, her being the shortest of the three and also the one trying to get their attention.

"If you're not getting in mind if I do?" she asks smoothly.

Kira gives her a covert once-over and can see just from standing that she was no civilian. Her stance and bearing clearly said military to her.

"Oh, I'm sorry, please, be take it," Tolle responds and moves aside for the other group.

as Kira watches them move her cell begins to warble in the warning tone she uses for emergencies. She quickly fishes it out and sees it's Raine.

"Yes?"

"We may have a problem," she says. "A short time ago we detected a pair of ZAFT cruisers enter Heliopolis space following an EAF ship. After docking the two ZAFT ships docked behind a space rock and soon after launched a pair of personnel flyers. And we barely picked up on those."

Kira looks up and makes sure the military trio are gone, then responds. "So it's a good bet that they're here to either capture or destroy the mobile suits and ship."

"That's what it looks like," Raine says. "I've already moved up to alert status amber and informed our people watching over the EAF project to keep an eye on things."

"Good," Kira nods, "What kind of ships came to Heliopolis?"

"From what we can tell the two ZAFT ships are a Laurasia and a Nazca identified as the _Gamow_ and, get this, the _Vesalius_."

Kira's face falls at hearing that name. 'No way, it can't be,' she thinks. She swears quietly. "I seriously hope it's not who I think it is, 'cause if it is we may have to launch ahead of schedual. Tell Commander Badgiruel to be ready to launch on my command. The code is Avenger."

"Roger that. Over and out."

"What is it?" Tolle asks.

Kira looks him in the eye, "We may have one hell of a complication. It seems the infamous Rau Le Creuset is here and knows about the EAF equipment being stored here at Heliopolis."

Miriallia looks mildly disturbed by this. "Do you think he'll attack the colony?"

Kira motions them toward a waiting auto-taxi as she says, "If I know that lunatic more than likely." She got into the car and input their destination. "I wouldn't be surprised if he equipped his GINNs with heavy artillery. He never was known to have much of a moral compass."

As the car starts up she leans back and sighs. This day just gets worse and worse by the second and Kira thinks it's only going to continue to get worse. They arrive at the Morgenroete facility without incident and quickly got to the lab. There they find their other two accomplices Sai Argyle and Kuzzy Buskirk. Sai looks up and greets Kira as she and the others come in the door. Kira is about to say something about the warning she received earlier, but them notices someone else in the room with them. She stood against the wall wearing a brown coat and pants with a beret on her head. Something about her struck a chord in Kira's mind, but for some reason couldn't place face to name. 'Ah well, figure it out later.' She walks over to where Tolle and Kuzzy are talking, most likely about their guest, and asks, "So where's the Prof.?"

Kuzzy shrugs, "Don't know, haven't seen him in about forty-five minutes."

"Huh, weird," Kira murmures quietly.

She moves off and talks to Sai, who hands her a disk from Dr. Kato for examination and the group settles in to get back to work. Things move along fairly well over the next hour, the group of programmers working on getting the bugs out of the program they've been working on. Occasionally Tolle would get into the human-sized frame, which looks very similar to a mobile suit cockpit, in the middle of the room to test out their modifications. They weren't all that successful. Over the hour Kira racked her brain trying to figure out who that girl by the wall is and finally places where she's seen her before. Cagalli Yula Athha, daughter of the leader of Orb Nara Yula Athha.

'What the heck! What's the 'Lioness of Orb' doing here?' Kira quickly does a mental diagnostic of the nano-comm system and is pleased when is comes back positive. She quickly connects to the mind of her second-in-command, San Badgiruel.

:Badgiruel, you read me: she calls.

:Loud and clear, boss.: she says.

:We may have another complication besides the Le Creuset team outside.:

:And what would that be:

:Cagalli Yula Athha is standing not five meters from me.:

:Oh damn, that's not good.: she is about to say more when a commotion cuts her off and she cuts to pay attention. She comes back real quick. :Kira, the ZAFT ships just launched! Prepare to get the hell out of there! We've got three incoming bogies, GINNs from the looks of it.:

:We'll get gone quickly. And I'll make sure to get Cagalli out of here in one piece.:

:You'd better! The last thing we need is to piss off the Chief Representative:

They sign off and Kira connects to the others and informs them of what they need to do. Each nods and pull hand guns from their desks and hide them on themselves. They then set to work taking information from their terminals and downloading it to the _Defender_'s computer core. Once Kira sets her computer to automatic she gets up and heads over to Cagalli.

"Miss Athha, I'm going to have to ask you to come with us quickly." Before the bland girl can ask how she knew Kira waves it off. "No time for explanations now. I've been informed that we're about to be attacked by ZAFT ships and need to move quickly." She points to her temple, "And to answer your question we have nano-comms. Anyway, the ZAFTs are here because the EAF's constructing mobile suits here on Heliopolis."

Cagalli slumps, "So it is true… Orb is building weapons for the Alliance."

"That's not entirely true," Kira tries to comfort her, "Our sources say your father has no knowledge of this. We're fairly sure it's one or more officials that are supporting this endeavor; we're just not sure who yet. When we know, you'll know."

Cagalli seems to bounce back a bit at the knowledge that her family is in no way involved with the EAF, but it disturbs her that members of her father's council would try something like this. They are supposed to be neutral. "Who are you people anyway?"

"I'm Kira Yamato," she introduces herself, "I'm a Coordinator here at Heliopolis. Over there we have Sai Argyle and Miriallia Haw, they're the same. And our Natural friends Tolle Koenig and Kuzzy Buskirk."

Just as the information dump is finished the ground under them shakes sending both girls to the floor. "Looks like it's begun," Kira says as she picks herself up. She turns to the others. "Evac to the _Defender_, now!" she turns back to Cagalli, only to see her heading out the door. "Wha…? Where are you going! Damn!" back to the others she says, "I'll be back! Get to the ship!" before the others could argue she's out the door in the direction she is sure Cagalli went in. putting on a burst of speed she quickly catches up to her charge and grabs her by the wrist.

"Let me go!" Cagalli yells.

"Forget it! I have to get you out of here," Kira argues.

"I can't go, not until I see them for myself!"

Cagalli looks the taller girl in the eye until Kira caves in and nods. She is exactly what she'd been told; hot headed and impulsive. But even so, she's only looking out for the best interests of her country. She releases Cagalli's wrist and wraps her arm around her shoulders. "Come on, this way." She led Cagalli down another corridor toward the factory district where she knew the MSs would be kept. Another blast sends them off their feet to the ground again and Kira looks back to see the path back is nothing but rubble. 'Well guess we have no choice now but to go forward.' Kira pick the both of them up and starts down the corridor again, keeping Cagalli close. At the same time she activates her comm. again.

:Code Avenger! I repeat, code Avenger! San, we're gonna need pickup.:

:What happened:

:The path behind us got blasted and we're cut off from the others. Cagalli and I will get out through the factory district. I want you to launch, now:

:Roger that! We can be there in twenty minutes:

They cut connection and Kira kept running with Cagalli, for fear that another section would collapse. Eventually they made it to an open door and into the sunlight. Gunfire could be heard as they came to the guard rail and look down into the factory area. They see EAF soldiers and ZAFT infiltrators having a fire fight below. Cagalli falls to her knees, her hands griping the railing as she thinks of how far her country's fallen. Out the corner of her eye Kira notices movement. Looking over she sees a ZAFT soldier aiming down at the woman firing from one of the mobile suits. She quickly whips out her gun from behind her and fires at the person, hitting him in the helmet and killing him.

'Good thing I thought to load the armor piercing rounds,' she thinks. She begins laying down suppression fire from above and forces the ZAFT soldiers to keep their heads down for a bit. When her clip runs dry she ejects it and reloads with one of the two she stashed in her pocket earlier. Coming to a quick decision she puts her gun away and grabs Cagalli.

"Hey, what are you doing!" she exclaims.

"Hang on tight!" Kira says and gathers the other girl up in her arms. She backs up and getting a running start, jumps the railing. Cagalli holds on and tries not to yell as they fall and they come to a jarring halt as they land on one of the suits, the same one the older woman is firing from. Keeping Cagalli behind her Kira got out her gun again and fired at several ZAFT infiltrators, forcing them to take cover.

"Who're you?" the older woman asks.

"Introductions later," Kira responds. She again empties her clip and reloads while the EAF woman fires her machine gun into the crowd. The other woman's gun ran out of ammo right about the same time as Kira's. Kira tosses her weapon and wonders what to do next. Unfortunately she hadn't planned for this. She watches the other woman pull out a semi-auto and shoot a ZAFT wearing red in the face. Another in red dashes out of cover toward them. He tosses his weapon as it seems he, too has run out of ammunition. Kira pulls a knife from her vest as the ZAFT red charges in with one of his own. With his jetpack he leaps up on the leg of the MS and comes at them. Kira puts herself in front and waits for the other, but freezes when she sees the face.

"Athrun!" she calls.

Her old friend, Athrun Zala, freezes in his tracks as he stairs at her. "Kira?"

The two friends stand stock still as they stair each other down. An explosion pulls them out and Athrun jumps to the other mobile suit and jumps in the cockpit.

"Hey!" Kira looks behind and looks at the EA woman. "Get in!" she pushes Cagalli in and leaps in after. Kira follows after a moment of staring in the direction Athrun took. 'I can't believe it. How can Athrun be fighting?' it perplexes her. She then follows the other two into the cockpit and goes to one side to stay out of the way. 'These things really weren't made for passengers,' she thinks.

The G.U.N.D.A.M. starts up and breaks free of its cradle, standing tall, even as the facility around it crumbles….

Murrue: Peace has ended for Kira and her friends. They must now fight for what they believe in against impossible odds at a time when they are not yet ready. At the same time Rau Le Creuset fights against his long-time enemy and rival Mu La Flaga for power over the top-secret weapons. Next on Mobile Suit Gundam Seed; "Its name is Gundam"

To the land of wars, come back to life, Gundam!

My first real attempt at a Gundam fic. How'd I do for this first time. Inspired by Dragoon Swordsman's "Valkyrie's Run". A good fic that people should go read.


	2. Its Name Is Gundam

Gundam Seed AU

Divergent Path

Disclaimer: Yzak Blasted it. Let's get on with it…

Chapter Two:

Its Name is Gundam

Natarle: Year 70 of the Cosmic Era. Tensions were mounting between Earth and the ZAFT organizations. Due to the Blood Valentine tragedy these tensions suddenly escalated into a full-scale war. It was a forgone conclusion that the Earth Forces, with its superior numbers would be victorious, but these initial assessments proved to be false. Almost eleven months have passed since the war began, with no end in sight.

As the ZAFT pilot moves off toward the other machine Murrue Ramius shoves the blond girl into the cockpit and calls to the brunet standing a few feet away to get in. She follows the first girl in and sits in the pilot's seat, a second later followed by the other girl who quickly gets to one side. 'These things really weren't made for passengers,' she thinks, unaware that her thoughts were mirrored by the girl on her right.

She looks around at the controls and begins start up. "At least we can save this one. Even I should be able to pilot it." The controls and outside monitors come online.

Kira looks out the vid-screen at the other machine and thinks of the face she saw. 'Athrun? No. That's not possible.' She looks down at the terminal.

WELCOME TO M.O.S.

MOBILE SUIT OPERATION SYSTEM

/VERSION NV8 - N099/

O.M.N.I.

Oppose Militancy & Neutralize Invasion Enfarcer

O.M.N.I. Enfarcer

General

Unilateral

Neuro - Link

Dispersive

Automatic

Maneuver

Synthsis System

'The hell… it's a G.U.N.D.A.M.?' Kira thinks. 'I didn't think the EAF or Orb had the capability to build something this sophisticated. Then again, Orb has been known to surprise even me on occasion. And if the ones involved are who I think, maybe I've underestimated them…'

Outside the Gundam's eyes light and it begins tearing out of its cradle, the power cables popping off. The Gundam, Strike, stands tall, even as the facility around it crumbles.

Out in the colony the colony-wide emergency system is active.

(A Level 8 evacuation has been issued for all of Heliopolis. Residents are to make their way to the closest shelters at once.)

Flay, Misha and Jessica run through the street trying to get back to Morgenroete and the _Defender_. They dodge panicked citizens as they pick their way back. Suddenly a missive explosion goes off in the distance and two machines come out of the smoke.

In his GINN Miguel Aiman looks over as the X-303 Aegis lands next to him. "Athrun!" he calls.

"Rusty failed," Athrun reported morosely. Miguel's mouth falls open as Athrun continues, "An Earth Forces officer has boarded the other machine."

The Strike lands awkwardly and stumbles across the ground. Murrue works the controls in an effort to not cause the Strike to fall down and brings up the tactical readout; the camera also picks up on a certain trio as they try to find somewhere to hide. Kira jerks forward when she sees.

"Flay!"

Miguel fires his rifle at the stumbling MS and only succeeds in knocking it to one side. Failing to hit it he pulls his sword and prepares to charge. Miguel looks back at Athrun, "All right, I'll capture this one. You get yours back to the ship."

Athrun hesitates a moment. 'Was that Kira? No couldn't be. But she did say her parents were moving to an Orb territory.' He gets into the OS and makes a few last minute adjustments to the system.

Miguel charges in while Strike walks slowly forward. Murrue sees him coming and manages to fly out of the way before the suit could get hit. The landing jarred Cagalli and she falls into Murrue's lap. "Stay back! You want to get killed!" she yells.

"Sorry!" Cagalli said and quickly moves herself. And just as she does the GINN leaps up and brings its sword up for a high over head strike that would cleave the Gundam in half if something wasn't done.

Murrue hits a button on the control panel and outside the armor changes color from mat-gray to blue and white with red and gray trim. She brings the arms up and blocks the GINN's sword, causing sparks to fly from the contact.

"What!" Miguel exclaims. He tries pressing harder, hoping to somehow cut through the mobile suit in front of him.

"This mobile suit…" Kira whispers. 'I can't believe they gave it Phase-Shift armor. Our intel never said anything about this.' Her eyes narrow, 'How much information are we missing?' she hears the lady next to her groan in pain and looks over to see she's sweating heavily and the mark on her arm has gotten slightly larger.

Aiman flies back a bit, cursing loudly. "What's with that armor? What the hell's going on?"

"They're all equipped with a system known as Phase-Shift armor," Athrun responds, "It renders them nearly invulnerable to conventional weapons." He then activates his own PS armor, coloring it red with black and gray trim. Missile trucks launched rockets at them and Athrun had no trouble picking them off with his CIWS. Another missile truck tares around a corner and it to is slagged.

"You've gotta get out of here now, Athrun!" Miguel says. "You can't stick around this place forever."

Athrun looks over at the Strike and sees Kira again in his mind's eye, his older sister in all but name. (a.n. they're actually five months and eleven days apart for those who don't know.) Athrun takes off and heads for an exit.

Miguel again takes off and charges at the Strike. Murrue tries to divert his attack using the CIWS, but the rounds do nothing to slow him. In fact the rounds miss him completely.

'The calibration's off!' Kira thinks.

The ZAFT pilot smirks, "Doesn't matter how good your armor is," he mutters, "if you can't defend yourself!" he slashes at the enemy mobile suit again, but misses as the Strike steps out of the way. He flies high again. Miguel descends and gives a violent slash across its front, causing it to stumble back hard. "Take this, Natural!" he slashes again and knocks the Strike into a building. Unfortunately it's the same building Flay and her friends were hiding behind with several other refugees. Kira catches them out of the corner of her eye and turns to watch them flee.

"Tryin' to pilot that mobile suit! You're in way over your head, Natural!" Miguel shouts. He moves in to stab the floundering MS and it tries to retreat backwards, right toward Kira's comrades and girlfriend. Things seem to slow down for Kira as she sees the GINN sword coming in and the worried looks on her three friend's faces. Without thinking she reaches over and hits a button on the panel, causing the suit to crouch, then grabs a manipulator and body-checks the GINN forcing it back to the ground.

Murrue looks over at the younger brunet. "How did you…?"

"There are still people around here," Kira says. She begins accessing the M.O.S. and gets into the main system. "If you're going to pilot something like this you should try making better use of it." She notes the GINN trying to get up and knows she doesn't have much time. She sighs when she sees the OS setup. "This is nuts. How do you expect to use a complex machine like this with your OS like this?"

"I-It hasn't reached the completion stage," Murrue stutters, "It can't be helped."

Kira looks at Cagalli, "is there enough room behind for you to get over here where I am?"

She looks, "I think so."

"Good, do it." She looks at Murrue, "Ma'am, could you please move over?"

Cagalli gets around the cockpit and Murrue moves over to where she'd been and Kira takes her place in the seat. Bringing sown the keyboard Kira access the programs. Actually Kira's quite impressed with the Naturals. They actually have built a halfway decent OS that a Natural pilot could almost use, but had no time to modify it further. So instead she makes a copy and stores it in a file of its own and begins reworking the current OS for a Coordinator to use.

Murrue looks over at the girl and wonders to herself if the girl she's taken on is a Coordinator. The GINN comes in again only to encounter stiff resistance from the CIWS of the Strike, causing it to stumble again. He corrects and tries to stab it again, but Kira levels a punch at the ZAFT suit knocking it back yet again and into a building. Kira continues her modifications of the OS. "Take the calibrations and reset the zero moment point and CPG. Then connect the control module to the quazi-cortrx molecular ion pump and reconstruct the neural linkage network. Update the meta-motor, reset feed forward controls, convey function. Adjust for Coriolis deviation. Online." The pilot of the other suit got back up and if his mobile suit's movements are any indication he's good and mad.

The ZAFT pilot put away his sword and got back out his rifle, firing several shots at the Strike and forcing it back a couple feet. Kira responds by activating her verniers and taking to the sky to get sway from her friends a bit. The GINN follows her, letting off several rounds of rifle fire.

Kira checks her readout again. "Weapons?" she accesses the proper folder and doesn't like what she comes up with. Other than its CIWS its only other weapons are, "Armor Schneider? That's all there is?" even with this protest she pulls them from their hip sheaths and lands. The GINN follows suit, firing all the way. Kira charges in avoiding incoming fire and again uses the verniers to jet quickly over. "Stop it!" she shouts and stabs one knife in its arm and the other in the neck. Watching this Cagalli, who'd been fairly quiet, is awed by the drama she's watching. She'd never seen anyone handle a mobile suit with such grace, not even another Coordinator. Sparks fly and the enemy MS goes limp. Seconds later they see the ZAFT pilot blow the hatch and fly away with a jet pack.

Seeing this Murrue panics a bit, figuring what's about to happen. "This doesn't look good. Quickly, get away from the GINN!" she warns. It's too little, too late though. A couple seconds later the mobile suit blows up in their faces.

In the central corridor Natarle Badgiruel is brought back to consciousness when she bounces against a hard surface and having something, or someone, land against her front. Opening her violet eyes she sees the one who hit her is a dead worker. Sadness wells up in her as they float to the floor but she forces it aside for now. There will be time to morn their deaths later. She looks around as her brain begins to shake off a bit. "The ship. Where's the Archangel?" she quickly heads back down the tunnel toward the control room.

Outside Mu La Flaga is having a hard time fighting off the ZAFT GINN that's been terrorizing them this whole time. "Can't we do something about the difference in battle strength!" he growls. He fires a shot from his linear cannon, and then launches his tethered gunbarrels. A shot of his cannon takes out his enemy's rifle and several consecutive shots from the gunbarrels removes an arm, forcing it to retreat. With a brief lull in the combat for now La Flaga continues CAP of the area.

Kira feels a jolt and smacks her head against the back of the pilot's seat rousing her awake, as well as giving her a lager headache than she already had. Looking up she sees a grapple tether pulling them from the firestorm generated from the destroyed GINN. That tether is connected to a steal-gray and off-white ship. Too disoriented to use her nano-comm yet she activates the comm. in the Strike, "It's about time you got here." She grumbles.

San smiles wanly. "Sorry, commander. You alright?"

Kira touches the back of her head and winces a bit, "Oh yeah, Badgiruel, I'm just peachy." She reaches over and wakes Murrue and then Cagalli. The two finally come too as the Strike is set down in a park.

"What is that?" Murrue asks.

Kira smiles, "You see now the mobile assault ship _Defender_. Built here in secret for the purpose of ending this war between ZAFT and the EAF. We took specs for both organizations ships and combined them into something that was greater than the sum of their parts."

"How did you build a ship like this? Where did you get the resources?" Cagalli asks.

"We have several contacts in the Junk Guild. And we also diverted a few resources here ourselves." She sighs, "We just want to end this insane war…"

"You're trying to end the war, all on your own?" Murrue again.

Kira laughs, "Oh goodness no! But we can discuss this later once your ship gets here." The girl reaches down and opens the hatch. Getting out she watches the _Defender_ land a short distance away. Taking a deep breath she shakes off the remaining dizziness and once again activates her nano-comm.

:Flay, are you alright:

:I'm okay, Kira. So are Jess and Misha: she responds.

:Good. Can you see the ship from where you are:

:Yes, we've already been contacted and are on our way. See you soon, Kira:

:Yeah, you too:

They end communication and Kira uses the line to get down, soon followed by Murrue and Cagalli. Out of the ship comes a jeep, which comes up and stops a few yards from the Strike. Two people get out, one of them the captain of her ship, San Badgiruel, and the other San's XO Raine Mikamura. They stop before Kira and salute her in their modified form; bringing their right fists to the heart, then to the temple. Kira returns it before offering introductions.

"I'd like to introduce the command crew of my ship. These are Captain San Badgiruel and her XO Raine Mikamura."

"Excuse me, but did you say Badgiruel?" San nods. "Are you related to Natarle Badgiruel?"

"I'm her younger sister," the black haired girl replies. "And I happen to know that she's assigned to the Archangel."

"Yes. I'm lieutenant Murrue Ramius. I'm a staff officer on the Archangel in charge of…"

"The G-Weapon project, right?" Kira finishes.

Murrue sighs. "Seems you know about that too, huh?"

The other girl shrugs, "Not entirely. All we knew was mobile suits were being built here. We didn't know they were G.U.N.D.A.M.s." She turns back to her two officers, "See about getting a recharge for this suit and if there are any equipment trucks left related to this unit bring them."

"Yes, ma'am." Natarle says.

Back to Murrue she says, "If you'd provide information for my crew to locate the trucks they'll retrieve your equipment for you."

"Very well," she says.

A call brings her around and she sees Flay and the others running toward her. When she arrives flay throws herself into Kira's waiting arms, who spins her around and then kisses her quite fiercely. Keeping her arm around Flay's waist she again introduces them, "Lt. Ramius, I'd like to introduce Misha Yamano, Jessica Simmons, and finally my girlfriend Flay Allster. Girls, this is Lieutenant Murrue Ramius of the Atlantic Federation."

"Flay Allster? Daughter of…"

"Atlantic Federation minister George Allster?" Flay answers, "Yep." Her expression turns a bit darker, "I don't share my father's view on Coordinators."

Kira squeezes her one more time before releasing her. "Would you three mind keeping Miss Ramius company while I go work on something?"

She nods, "Sure, but what are you going to be doing?"

"I'm going to go upgrade the OS on the Strike," Kira says. "They actually had an almost working one for a natural, I'm just going to go tweak it a bit so a natural can make the best possible use of it. I'm expecting their pilot's gonna want to use it once their ship gets here to pick up their unit and crewman." So she meanders on back over to the Strike and gets in to work a bit on the operating system.

Natarle finally makes it back to the central station where the Archangel had been calling to anyone who could hear her. She receives no response. A floating object crosses her path and upon closer inspection she sees it's the captain's hat. Tears once again begin to well up in her eyes at the loss of life. Again she tries calling out in the hopes that someone survived.

"Are there any survivors? Hello! Can anyone hear me?"

Silence is all she gets. Just as she is about to give up hope of finding anyone alive in the wreckage she hears a sound to her right. She looks over and a door suddenly comes flying off its moorings. A person comes through and a light shines in her face for a moment before moving away again.

"Ensign Badgiruel! I'm glad to see you're okay," comes the voice of Arnold Neumann, "Please, ma'am come this way."

Natarle nods and follows Neumann through the door.

Outside Mu feels something amiss. An unsettling feeling in the pit of his stomach that often denoted either danger, or worse, his enemy Le Creuset was near. He keeps his eyes and sensors pealed for any sign of danger and continues his patrol.

In the park of Heliopolis Flay and the girls discuss with Murrue some of the things they had to do in order to keep the existence of the _Defender_ a secret, while still getting equipment so they could build it in time. Having launched a bit ahead of schedual had put a bit of a crimp on some of the things that need to be completed.

"I must admit," Murrue says some pride in her voice, "you young people are quite resourceful." She looks at their ship, "And at the same time I'm slightly concerned with how easily you broke into the Atlantic Federation database and acquired this data. I'm beginning to wonder just how badly compromised our system really is."

"Not as badly as you might think," Misha says offhanded. "While we were in there we only found a couple other instances of other intruders in the system. Must have been some seriously high end hackers to get in there. Other than that any information must have been leaked though some inside source."

That makes Ramius think. If information had been leaked by a ZAFT sympathizer, or worse Blue Cosmos, there's no telling what might happen. Looking back at the Strike and the young Coordinator currently working on it she seriously hopes that this war can be ended soon so they can all go back to living their lives.

Mu continues patrol of the surrounding space of Heliopolis, the feeling in his gut increasing. Something out of the corner of his eye, a flash of white, and he suddenly jinks his Moebius Zero out of the way of several shots from a ZGMF-515 CGUE. Only one person he knew around here owned one of those.

"Bastard! Is that you, Rau Le Creuset?" he snarls. He launches two of his gunbarrels and fires a couple rounds from his linear cannon as he dodges too and fro through rifle fire.

"You always seem to get in my way, Mu La Flaga!" comes Rau's voice over his comm., "Though I imagine you say the same thing about me."

Rau turns and flies into the colony interior. After a moment La Flaga follows.

"X-105 Strike to Earth Forces, please respond. Repeat, X-105 Strike here, Earth Forces, please respond." Kira is taking a short break from reconstructing the Strike's OS and Murrue had asked her to try contacting any EA vessels in the vicinity. She looks up, "Sorry, Miss Ramius, I'm afraid I can't get through."

The older woman smiles gently at Kira, "That's alright. I wasn't expecting you to get through, but felt to give it a try anyway."

A wry smile tugs at Kira's lips, "If you guys used nanotech like we do you wouldn't have to worry about this." She sees a light seem to come on over Murrue's head, but waves to cut off the idea she knows is forming, "No I can't tap in on you communication frequency. It doesn't work that way. Yet…" she adds.

"So eventually you'll be able to use it to access other communications units?" Ramius asks.

"Not just that," Kira says, "But eventually we'll be able to control our equipment with just our thoughts." She stiffens a bit and then her eyes take on a far away look that tells Ramius she's probably talking with someone. She comes back a few moments later.

"What is it?" she asks.

"Sensors have detected fighting in the colony core. I.D. reads a ZAFT ZGMF-515 CGUE and a TS-MA2mod.00 Moebius Zero. Our best guess is Le Creuset and Le Flaga are having it out."

The sound of truck engines are heard and the two get out to look. Two trucks come to a stop near the Strike and several people get out, along with Sai Argyle. He comes up to them, "Trailer numbers three and five survived the battle."

"What's in them?" Kira asks.

"Readouts indicate four is called the AQM/E-X03 Launcher Striker and consists of an "Agni" 320mm hyper impulse cannon and a combo 120mm anti-ship Vulcan gun and two 350mm gun launchers. The other is called the AQM/E-X01 Aile Striker, consisting of a high speed flight pack, two beam sabers, an anti-beam shield and a 57mm beam rifle." Sai reports.

Kira looks thoughtful a moment as she weighs her options. Cagalli, who had been quiet until now seated at the base of the Strike looks at her and wonders what she's thinking and determines to ask for one of those nano-systems for herself.

"Alright, I want you to position the number three trailer and fit the Aile Striker. The less chance to damage Heliopolis the batter," Kira says.

"Roger," Sai confirms.

"Are you expecting to have to fight?" Cagalli asks.

Kira turns back to the Strike and motions the slightly shorter blond to follow. "Yeah, I am. And there's no time to prep the Wing, so I'll just have to fight with Strike again."

Cagalli nods then grabs Kira's arm to stop her. As Kira turns Cagalli hugs her. "Be careful out there, 'k." For some reason Cagalli feels very comfortable around Kira; like a sister or cousin that she'd never knew. (Oh if she only knew, huh? Author)

Kira nods and returns it. "I'll try. Now get to the _Defender_, you'll be safe there."

"Right," the other girl nods and runs to the waiting jeep.

In the colony core Mu and Rau fight furiously in an attempt to destroy each other. The only difference in tactics is that Mu was trying to take great care to cause as little damage as possible.

"Dammit! Why in this place?" he fires several more blasts of his linear cannon, but the CGUE manages to avoid them.

"Mu I'd actually be pleased if you vanished right about now!" Rau yells and comes from behind a support structure and puts several holes in the top gunbarrel, causing it to explode. The shrapnel from that catches the side two and destroyed them. Mu ejects the lower one to regain stability.

"Launch the ship?" Neumann asks, "But that's impossible with the number of people we have aboard, even with half the bridge crew present. There's too many systems that need monitoring." He and the other bridge members stand around looking at Ensign Badgiruel like she's grown another head.

"The time you're spending arguing about it is time you could be using to make it possible. Morgenroete could still be under attack for all we know! We have to get out." Natarle reclines back in the captain's seat and massages a temple. 'Man have I got a headache.' She looks back at Chief Petty Officer Neumann, "So what you're saying is that we should remain confined in here and ignore what's happening elsewhere?"

"No, ma'am," he sighs, and takes his place at helm.

"Then take you positions!" she orders, "And follow the computer's instructions! After all, this ship was designed to be operated by a skeleton crew. There's enough of us that we should be able to pull this off." Everyone takes their positions. "Begin launch sequence! Due to the emergency, we'll omit C-30 to L-21 from the process! Main power online!"

All around them the greatest ship the EAF has ever constructed, the _Archangel_, begins to come to life.

In the core the two exchange fire in a dangerous dance, neither truly able to hit the other. But Mu knows that it's only a matter of time before either one scores a hit. Mu's last gunbarrel is destroyed when Rau brings his mobile suit crashing down on it, leaving Mu with only his cannon to rely on.

The equipment truck containing the Aile Striker parts is positioned behind Strike, its bay doors open revealing the flight gear.

: Hurry up, Kira: says Raine. : They've almost made it this far:

: We're going, we're going: She responds.

Just as the Aile pack is being attached an explosion is heard above and out shoot the CGUE and Moebius Zero.

La Creuset gets a look at it. "So that's it, huh." He zooms in on the _Defender_. "And what have we here? I don't remember reports of a second ship."

Mu also catches sight of it. 'What's that?'

His comm. squawks, "This is the mobile battle ship _Defender_ to Mu Le Flaga. This is the captain speaking. Our ship is friendly, repeat our ship is friendly."

Hearing that he ignores the ship and dives after La Creuset, who's dive-bombing the Strike. Mu manages to distract him by coming in low and firing a round, causing Rau to pull up and by time for the others to mount the equipment. The blond Coordinator finally gets the upper hand on Mu and slices off the barrel of the linear cannon. Again he dive-bombs, but too late. The Aile unit mounts to it hard points and Kira activated the PS armor. Boosting off she takes to the air and fires off several rounds of her beam rifle at the annoying CGUE. Suddenly they become distracted as the ground near the remains of Morgenroete explodes in a fiery conflagration. Taking this moment Kira fires her rifle again and destroys Rau's right arm. Another shot almost hits his cockpit, but he moves in time so it only takes his left leg.

As he watches the warship _Archangel_ fly from the fire like a phoenix reborn he turns and makes his way out. 'This isn't over!' he thinks.

End Chapter Two

Natarle: Kira and the others have no choice but to team up with the _Archangel_ in order to survive against the ZAFT. Badgiruel discovers family and finds out just what's been happening these past months. They are now prisoners on Heliopolis, a land now consumed by the war. ZAFT forces launch another brutal attack that could endanger the entire colony. But the rogue ship, the _Defender_ reveals the fire power at its disposal in the form of the Gundam known as Heavyarms. Two young friends also meet again, this time in combat.

Next on Mobile Suit Gundam Seed: "Collapsing Land".

Shoot down the approaching menace, Gundam!

Did I do well? As I said I'm trying to remain faithful to the story ark, mostly. Feedback and suggestions appreciated!


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